Chicago Booth Claims MBA Stock Picker Victory

CHAPEL Hill, N.C. ( TheStreet) -- The University of Chicago's Booth School of Business defeated 14 of the nation's top MBA programs Friday in a stockpicker competition in Chapel Hill, N.C.

Students Kyle Akin, Aaron Bianco and Mac Elatab cruised to a unanimous No. 1 performance in the final round of the Alpha Challenge as judges from various asset management firms favored the Booth team's mock pitch to take a long position on DigitalGlobe ( DGI) and a short position on GenCorp ( GY).

The event, hosted by the University of North Carolina, showcased top student talent, many of whom said they hoped to eventually work in investment management.

It was a "great" contest with a high level of competition and challenging questions from the judges, Elatab said. When asked if his Booth team would celebrate the victory, Elatab chuckled and said, "I think there's a Tar Heels game in town."

Each business school represented consisted of three MBA students, who received a universe of 90 publicly traded companies on Nov. 3 and submitted by Nov. 11 a power point presentation pitching one company to "short" and one company to hold "long."

Friday morning featured a preliminary round of 15 teams, including Yale University, University of Virginia's Darden School of Business -- who finished second and third, respectively -- UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and Columbia University, among others.

The 15 teams were split into four different groups, in which they presented a 15-minute verbal pitch and answered judges' questions for an additional 20. The top team from each group advanced to the final round.